Abdelaziz Salame, the highest political leader of the Tawhid Brigade
in Aleppo, has issued a statement online where he claims to speak for 13
different rebel factions. [..] what it purports to do is to gut Western strategy on Syria and put an end to the exiled opposition.
The statements has four points, some of them a little rambling. My summary:

All military and civilian forces should unify their ranks in an
“Islamic framwork” which is based on “the rule of sharia and making it
the sole source of legislation”.

The undersigned feel that they can only be represented by those who lived and sacrificed for the revolution.

Therefore, they say, they are not represented by the exile groups.
They go on to specify that this applies to the National Coalition and
the planned exile government of Ahmed Touma, stressing that these groups
“do not represent them” and they “do not recognize them”.

In closing, the undersigned call on everyone to unite and avoid conflict, and so on, and so on.

Who are these people? The alleged signatories make up a major part of the northern rebel
force, plus big chunks also of the Homs and Damascus rebel scene, as
well as a bit of it elsewhere. Some of them are among the biggest armed
groups in the country [..] All together, they control at least a few tens of thousand
fighters, and if you trust their own estimates (don’t) it must be way
above 50,000 fighters.
Most of the major insurgent alliances are included. Liwa al-Tawhid,
Liwa al-Islam and Suqour al-Sham are in both the Western- and
Gulf-backed Supreme Military Council (SMC a.k.a. FSA) and the SILF,
sort-of-moderate Islamists. Ahrar al-Sham and Haqq are in the SIF, very
hardline Islamists. Jabhat al-Nosra, of course, is an al-Qaida faction.
Noureddin al-Zengi are in the Asala wa-Tanmiya alliance (which is led by
quietist salafis, more or less) as well as in the SMC. [..] already at this stage, it looks – on paper, at
least – like the most powerful insurgent alliance in Syria.
[..]
Is this a big deal? Yes, if the statement proves to accurately
represent the groups mentioned and they do not immediately fall apart
again, it is a very big deal. It represents the rebellion of a large
part of the “mainstream FSA” against its purported political leadership,
and openly aligns these factions with more hardline Islamist forces.
That means that all of these groups now formally state that they do
not recognize the opposition leadership that has been molded and
promoted by the USA, Turkey, France, Great Britain, other EU countries,
Qatar, and – especially, as of late – Saudi Arabia.
[..]
Why now? According to a Tawhid Brigade [Liwa al-Tawhid] spokesperson, it is because of
the “conspiracies and compromises that are being forced on the Syrian
people by way of the [National] Coalition”. [..]
Mohammed Alloush of the Islam Brigade (led by his relative, Mohammed
Zahran Alloush), who is also a leading figure in the SILF alliance, was
up late tweeting
tonight. He had a laundry list of complaints against the National
Coalition, including the fact that its members are all, he says,
“appointed”, i.e. by foreign powers. He also opposed its planned
negotiations with the regime. This may have been in reference to a (widely misinterpreted) recent statement by the Coalition president Ahmed Jerba [see below]. Alloush also referred to the recent deal
between the National Coalition and the Kurdish National Council, and
was upset that this will (he thinks) splinter Syria and change its name
from the Syrian Arab Republic to the Syrian Republic.Who’s missing? These are of course not all the rebels; far from it. Dozens or
hundreds of small and local groups are missing from this alliance, just
like they’ve been missing from every other alliance before it. Some
really big groups are also not in there, like the Farouq Battalions or
the Ahfad al-Rasoul Brigades, both of them quite closely aligned with
the SMC and the National Coalition.
[..]
Most notably, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham [ISIS] – Syria’s most
querulous al-Qaida faction – is absent from the list. Given the recent surge in tension
between the Islamic State and other factions, that seems significant.
Does it mean the new coalition is in fact aimed at isolating the
Islamic State, while also upping its own Islamist credentials? Striking
a kind of third way between the Western-backed SMC and its al-Qaida
rival? Maybe. The question then remains, what should we make of Jabhat
al-Nosra [Nusra front] being included, which is also an al-Qaida group.
[Rami al-Lolah ‏@RamiAlLolah @Charles_Lister JAN is needed in the
alliance for the sake of isolating ISIS AQ! 12:03 AM - 25 Sep 13 ]
In either case, the Northern Storm Brigade
– which was routed by the Islamic State in its home town of Aazaz just
recently – has quickly expressed support for the new coalition. In a
statement posted online, they fell over themselves to explain how they’ve always been all about implementing sharia law.
This is of course, how shall I put it, not true. [..]
the reason that the Northern Storm Brigade has suddenly gone all
Islamist is that they desperately seek protection from Tawhid, after
being beaten up by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). Perhaps
they also figure that this alliance might be the only thing big and mean
enough to actually crush the Islamic State. Size, money and momentum
are the things to look for in Syrian insurgent politics – ideology comes
fourth, if even that. That’s also why this statement seems so
important.
On the other hand, the statement is in no way hostile to the ISIS. It
might in fact suit them pretty well, since it weakens the hand of the
Western-backed camp and adds weight to Islamist demands. When I asked a
representative of Tawhid, he said the reason they’re not on the list of
signatories is just because they’re not members. If they want to, and
share the principles, they could join. Is it just a local thing?
There’s also not that much of a presence from the Syrian south. The
Furqan Brigade is an exception – founded in Kanaker, and now stretching
from the western Ghouta to Quneitra. Then you have the Islam Brigade in
Damascus, the Homsi Haqq Brigade, and so on. Generally speaking,
however, this list of names has a heavy northern flavor to it,
specifically Aleppine.On the scanned original statement,
there’s even an addition of “Aleppo” next to the name of “Abdullah
al-Shami”, who signed for Jabhat al-Nosra. The Tawhid spokesperson,
again, says that this doesn’t mean they only signed on for the Aleppo
branch. He insists that the alliance is intended for all of Syria.

[..] foreign funders could put the squeeze on groups that have not grasped the magnitude of what they just said.

It was no coincidence that this repudiation of Syria’s Washington-backed
leadership followed swiftly from several major turning points. The
first was the calamitous US climb-down from direct military action for
the Assad regime’s August 21 chemical weapons attack in East Ghouta. The
majority of yesterday’s rebel signatories had been hoping for weeks for
US airstrikes on regime installations – however minor or symbolic these
might have been – because they would have at least afforded the chance
for opportunistic ground assaults. Two weeks ago, while on assignment in
Antakya, I interviewed half a dozen fighters who felt, not for the
first time, completely disillusioned with the United States for a
promised intervention that got un-promised overnight

The truth is that the West has lost Syria. Simply because they deceived
the Syrian people into waiting for two and a half years for the
international support that never came. For two and a half years they had
hope. But in Washington, London, Paris, Moscow the bureaucrats had
dinners and elegant debates over doctrines and interests. Now,
the Syrians’ hope is gone. Eventually, they turned to the only faction
that can actually give them a chance to earn their freedom.

Opposition revolt Reports of Wednesday's fighting came as 13 rebel groups released a
statement saying they rejected the authority of any foreign-based
opposition groups, including the internationally recognised National
Coalition. The groups include members of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), nominally
the military arm of the National Coalition, but also groups such as the
al-Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra. Critics of the National Coalition, which is based in Istanbul,
Turkey, say it is not transparent with its funding and political
functioning. They say it is out of touch with people in Syria, where more than
100,000 have been killed and large chunks of territory have been
destroyed by combat and shelling. Some Jabhat al-Nusra fighters and supporters who spoke to Reuters
news agency said their groups had been courting ideologically moderate
rebels as they watched their relationship sour with the National
Coalition.
Saudi Arabia, which had taken over as the main foreign player and
financier of the National Coalition, is said to have been trying to
sideline Islamist rebels and bolster secular forces. "Our brigades are tired of the National Coalition's strategy. It is
acting on the exterior and ignoring the interior," one Nusra supporter
said. "And a lot of the moderate Islamists were shoved aside when Qatar's
role was overtaken by Saudi Arabia. The Saudis started aggressively
supporting the secular groups."

Lots of media have now reported on the joint statement based mainly on
this blog post. Unfortunately, some have shed all the “what if” and
caution.
[..]
I contacted the Tawhid Brigade spokesperson I talked to earlier, who had spoken of this as a gathering (tajammou) or bloc (takattul)
that might have more lasting significance. He says there is so far
nothing in the way of a common organization. He explicitly denied that
it is anything like the SILF or SIF insurgent alliances. There will be
more statements, but at this stage he seems to say it’s really only a
position paper by the 11 or 13 (see below) factions involved. [..] When
I pointed out that Abdulqader Saleh’s rather offhand comment on Twitter
using the phrase “Islamic Alliance” or “Islamic Coalition” (al-tahaluf al-islami)
could be interpreted as the name of a new group, and that this version
is now gaining currency in the media, he responded “it could become
that, but so far there’s nothing”.

[..] two of the groups included on the list of signatories above are not
mentioned in either the video statement by Abdulaziz Salame or the
scanned copy of the declaration. The groups in question are the Haqq
Brigade of Homs and the Furqan Brigades of Quneitra.
That’s true. I copied and translated my list from a text version on
the Tawhid Brigade website. That text has since been altered to fall in
line with the signed copy and the video statement, removing the names of
both groups. According to the Tawhid Brigade spokesman, both Furqan and
Haqq were part of the drafting process and are verbally in agreement
with the statement, but he says they were not present for the signing
ceremony.

Incidentally, the Al Jazeera report cited above seems to indicate that the rebels are making some gains on the ground, although they are small. ------------
Opposition activists told Al Jazeera on Wednesday that the fighters
were now "in control of most of Ramtha post" in the southern province of
Deraa.

The clashes came as the UN inspectors returned to Syria to
investigate the use of chemical weapons. Convoys of inspectors arrived
at a Damascus hotel on Wednesday, a week after they confirmed that
sarin gas was used in an attack August 21 in the suburbs of the Syrian
capital. ... The team of investigators is expected to examine the
alleged use of chemical weapons up to 14 times in Syria's 30-month
conflict.

On the ground, meanwhile, fierce fighting erupted in the strategic
northern town of Areeha, forcing locals to seek cover in nearby
caves. Rebels are battling for control of the town, which sits along a
key supply route for Assad's forces. In the northern province of
Aleppo, rebels said they seized control of the Madajen district,
another key supply route for the regime that is located near the
airport road.

Activists in the northeastern province of Raqqa reported the death of
five people in air raids by government fighter jets on the city of
Tabqa.

Fighter jets also dropped shells near a bakery [in] rebel-held Raqqa
city, activists reported, causing several casualties and fire outbreak
in the area. Activist[s] in the Damascus suburb of Ghouta witnessed
heavy artillery shelling by regime forces on Wednesday. The town has
been under blockade for several months and medical supplies there are running desperately low.------------